Meeting Mayor Meeks
by ShadownDust
Summary: Judy Hopps and Chief Bogo get called down to City Hall to meet Zootopia's newest Mayor. ((A one-shot I was recently inspired to write))


Judy had to admit that the Mayor's office was very impressive, the Capitol Building itself was a wonder of modern architecture, wood, and marble flowing together through the floor, and in the walls concrete replaced marble making wavelike patterns throughout much of the building. The waiting room outside of the Mayor's office she and Chief Bogo were currently located kept up that theme. The large Secretary's Desk flanked on either side by small potted trees, and the Secretary herself a businesslike Doe, who was busy clicking away at her keyboard, the speed and intensity at which she typed being the only noise in the room sans the deep, heavy breathing of Bogo, and every now and again the rustle of paper when he turned the page of some random magazine he had picked up the moment he had entered. Apparently he fully expected to be waiting for some time, and he was proven right as nearly half an hour later they were still waiting, and though Judy tried staying patient she did feel a bit miffed by the whole thing, the Mayor had called them down for this meeting, so the least he could do was keep to his own schedule.

Instead of sitting and reading like her boss, Judy had taken to pacing back and forth, admiring the large, gold, metal letters which identified the double doors as the Mayor's Office, and then walking over and shuffling through the stack of magazines, she had no intent on reading any of the rubbish, but rather she amused herself briefly by flicking through the pictures briefly before dropping them and sighing. Then she'd repeat. Pace back and forth, look at the sign, flip through magazines, sigh, and repeat. This had been going practically since the moment they'd arrived, and though Judy could tell that her actions were wearing on the patience of both the Secretary and Bogo, she couldn't really help it, she was a Bunny of action, and sitting around for long periods of time had never been her speciality, she felt like she should be doing something at that moment.

Finally, she broke the routine and stood directly in front of the doors as if daring them to stay closed against her will, she crossed her arms and huffed, her foot tapping against the ground repeatedly.

"Remind me to never assign you a stakeout, Officer Hopps." Judy broke out of her staring contest and turned to Bogo, who was still sitting cross-legged, but now he was looking up at her, amusement at her impatience clearly displayed on his face by way of a slight grin. She resisted the urge to backtalk her superior and instead walked over and sat back down on the sofa with a huff.

"I know I should be more patient, but it's been forty minutes, do you think he forgot about us?"

"That's one thing you'll learn about politicians while on the job, Hopps; they enjoy making people wait. It's usually a display of power for them, you just gotta learn to not let it get to you." Judy was briefly reminded of her partner own saying, _'Never let them see that they get to_ yah _'_ though she kept that comparison to herself, knowing for a fact that Chief Bogo would not appreciate the comparison between himself and Nick Wilde. Instead, she opted for a smile.

"I'll try and keep that in mind, sir."

As if on some unseen queue the Doe suddenly stood up, and walked over to them, her hands clasped neatly in front of her. "If you two will follow me, Mayor Meeks is ready to see you."

Bogo set his magazine down and stood up, following the Secretary, and Judy was directly on his heels, not being able to resist letting out an 'Oh thank god' slip out under her breath, though judging by the flick of the Doe's ears it hadn't been quiet enough. The Doe led them to the double doors, and quickly swung them both open inwards, they were completely soundless as they opened, no creaking or groaning, even though they looked to be solid Oak. Once they had opened completely Judy peaked around Bogo's legs to get a better view of the office, and she felt that it was suitably impressive for the occupant it held. The Mayor's Office kept up with the motif from the rest of the building, with a large marble floor, and wood framing it around the edges and giving it the appearance of a ripple, the walls kept the waves of concrete and wood going, and the far wall was taken up by a very large window overlooking the city. The only furniture worth note in the office was the very imposing looking desk flanked on either side by a flag, with an office chair behind that looked big enough to seat a lion, which it in fact had. There were also two smaller chairs placed in front of the desk, not huge, but big enough that Bogo would be able to sit in one if need be, there were also some built in shelves along the walls but these sat bare. In fact there were no real decorations or personal touches in the office, rather the walls to the right and left were taken up with towers of boxes, the ones on the left were much smaller towers, and the framed painting of Mayor Lionheart jutting out of one of the boxes told Judy that those must've been the previous occupants personal belongings. The boxes on the right side, however, were behemoth towers in comparison, all office boxes and many that seemed to have the words 'Urgent' scribbled onto the side of them for no obvious reason, and some of the boxes had clear signs of water damage, Judy suddenly realized that these must've been the boxes that had been in the boiler room where Bellwether had her office.

"Ah, yes, Chief Bogo and Officer Hopps I presume? Pleasure, I'm sure, welcome welcome. Please sit down."

Judy examination of the office was interrupted by a warm, and surprisingly loud voice originating from the desk, when she looked over she saw the newest Mayor of Zootopia himself, Mayor Meeks the Mouse. He was a middle-aged looking Mouse from what she could tell, slight greying around his cheeks and at the tips of his ears, besides that he looked young and in shape, a sharp demeanor and look about him made him seem impressive despite his size, and his voice far surpassed his size, somehow it reminded her more of Bogo's speaking voice in volume, but much friendlier.

Judy was quick to take her own seat, Bogo on the other hand just glanced and the seat and then raised an eyebrow, clearly not trusting it to bear his weight.

"Chief Bogo, I assure you of that chairs capability in bearing your weight, now if you will please be seated we have much to discuss and though I'm sure you prefer looking down on those you talk to I'm afraid my neck is already cramping in far too many ways."

At Meeks insistence, Bogo finally relented, and slowly eased himself into the chair, even once he had sat down he still clearly didn't trust it and his posture showed he was preparing for it to give out under him any second now. Once Meeks saw him sit down he nodded and waved away his secretary, addressing the two still in his office.

"Now, I do thank you both for coming down. I'd apologize for the wait but frankly, I have many things to do, as you can clearly see from the state of this..from the state of 'my' office."

Judy noticed the way he described the office and thought it odd that the Mayor wouldn't consider the Mayoral Office to be his own, she decided it'd be rude to ask about that and instead opted to find out about the source of the boxes and why he was handling the.

"Mr. Mayor, if you don't mind my asking, weren't all these boxes from the office of Assistant Mayor Bellwether?"

Meeks scoffed in visible disgust at the name. "If you want to be technical Bellwether was 'Interim Mayor Bellwether', before your investigation wound her up in jail. But in answer to your question, no, the paperwork isn't hers." Judy cocked her head to the side, confused by that, Meeks noticed and he scratched his ear impatiently.

"Well, to put it simply Bellwether deliberately sidelined most of the paperwork scheduled to go through the Mayor's office, since Lionheart left her to manage most of the technical sides of things. She hid the piling up work and from what we can tell she instead worked on her 'evil plan'." Meeks sighed deeply rubbing his temples. "What resulted from this is that now City Hall is backed up underneath at least two years worth of paperwork due to her actions."

Judy was baffled by this, how could an entire government not notice that it was missing out on two years worth of paperwork? Meeks, as if reading her mind, laid that out as well. His hands now clasped behind his back as he paced across his desk.

"From what we can determine, she let just enough paperwork through that many believed that everything was just running so smoothly under Lionheart's administration that there was next to no paperwork. We think this was just another way she planned on seizing power, but regardless once she was imprisoned for her crimes we found the backlog, and we're still taking stock of how much damage has been done." Bogo nodded, readjusting himself in his chair.

"Does that have anything to do with why you wanted to speak with Officer Hopps and myself?"

Meeks stopped his pacing, he looked up at Bogo. "Yes, I see I heard right about you. Yes, it has many things to do with why I called you both down here, but firstly," He now turned to Judy, and she saw his face suddenly transform into a warm friendly expression. "I would like to formally thank you, Officer Judith Hopps, for your part in the unraveling of Bellwethers plans. Zootopia owes you a debt, Miss Hopps, and I fully plan on paying that debt as soon as I can."

"Oh, umm. No, it's no problem, it's my job. Well, I mean it wasn't my job at the time but I felt like it was my duty to clean up my own mess. Oh! Also, I had help, Nick Wilde, he's my current partner, he's a Fox, he also helped me a ton on that case. Without his help, I probably wouldn't have been able to do do that." Judy flustered on, only partially aware that she was rambling.

Mayor Meeks nodded, but his face looked a bit sterner at the mention of Nick, it made Judy suspicious that Meeks might just see a sly fox where Nick was involved, however Meeks canned that notion quickly.

"Yes, I am fully aware of Nicholas Wilde's actions, and the part he played during the case. However he was acting under your supervision, and since at the time Mr. Wilde was a conman, I'm afraid the city of Zootopia cannot formally recognize his help in this particular case."

Judy's ears bent slightly, she supposed she shouldn't have been surprised by this, Nick hadn't exactly done it willingly at first, but she still felt like Nick's help during the case should be appreciated by more than just her, he should get some sort of formal 'thanks for saving our butts'. Meeks' face stayed stern but a glimmer of mirth shone through his eyes and twitching mouth.

"Of course due to his help I was more than happy to push his application to the Police Academy through, despite his background. It's the least I could do for a hero."

Judy's ears shot back up at that, Meeks had pushed Nicks paperwork through? She supposed she shouldn't have been surprised that someone had, otherwise there's no way Nick could have made it into the academy with his 'colorful background'. Judy glanced at Bogo and judging by how nonchalant he looked about the whole thing she guessed he must have already known. He also didn't look interested in that in the faintest.

"Mr. Mayor, if you wanted to praise one of my Officers for doing her job, even if she did it very well, you hardly needed my permission, much less my presence."

Meeks turned to Bogo, he didn't look surprised by Bogo's perceived impatience, he nodded along as he walked over to be slightly closer to the Buffalo.

"Yes, you're right of course. I called you down for completely different reasons, Chief Bogo." Meeks reached behind him, grabbing a newspaper roughly twice his size he tossed it to Bogo who deftly caught it. "Read the headline if you would."

Bogo flicked the paper open and read the headline aloud. "Third Mayor Already a Failure? Mayor Behind on Paperwork by Two Years." Bogo raised an eyebrow at that and in reply Meeks huffed in anger.

"Some idiot leaked the fact that we're flooded by paperwork to the press, and they're running with the story. The last two Mayors have made huge headlines in the past few months, mostly by being criminals. The press is already burying me, trying to get as many headlines off my administration as they did my predecessors. To be fair it's a good story, not entirely true, but a good scoop nonetheless."

Bogo folded the paper back up and placed it over his lap. "Mr. Mayor, I'm afraid I can't arrest the press for this if that what you're getting at… as much as I'd like to." Meeks gave a hearty chuckle at that.

"Yes, that is a shame. But that's not why I wanted you here to speak with today. With the arrest of both the past Mayors under your belt right now the ZPD is looking better than ever. And so I called you down here wondering if you wouldn't mind appearing in a Press Conference with me, as a show of solidarity, if you will." Bogo nodded, clearly understanding more of what was going on than Judy was, she got the feeling that this entire conversation was over her pay grade.

"You want me to publicly show my support of you as Mayor, and hopefully, use that to fend off the attacks the press are making against you." It wasn't a question, Meeks answered it anyways.

"In essence yes, due to the… precarious nature of City Hall right now I need any allies I can get right now. Zootopia is closer to the brink of terrible chaos than even I'd like to admit, despite the actions of the ZPD to prevent this, and frankly speaking, we can't afford to stop now to elect another Mayor. If the public was to demand my resignation due to the headlines they read then I would have no choice, and it'd be another 5 months before someone was elected, and the problem would only get much worse."

Judy frowned deeply, her ears drooping, she couldn't help but think part of this was her responsibility, it had been her who had disposed of the last two Mayors directly, and she had caused so much turmoil already. Meeks must have noticed her feelings on this because he was suddenly turned towards her, an amusingly over-exaggerated mock-angry expression on his face.

"Ms. Hopps, I'd thank you kindly if you didn't try and steal any of the blame for this from Bellwether. I'd hate to see her getting a lighter sentence just because you went around blaming yourself for the things she caused, especially when they had nothing to do with your investigation or the press conference you were in." Judy nodded slightly in agreement, it was hard to argue with the Mouse, Meeks then turned back to Bogo who almost looked like he was impressed by Meeks, they shared a strange moment of what Judy could only assume was male bonding in their stare before Bogo stood up.

"I won't object to attending your press conference with you, Mr. Mayor. But I do expect something in return, as a favor."

Meeks gave Bogo a wide, honest grin. "How about a 60-year-old bottle of scotch and we'll call it even?"

Judy was very surprised to see Bogo returning the Mayor's grin full force, they shared a nod together and Bogo then walked off, Meeks himself walking over his desk and returning to some paperwork he had apparently been working on. Judy's shock left her motionless only a moment before she dashed after her boss. She caught up with Bogo a bit down the hall and she had to keep a brisk walk to keep pace with the much larger animal. She looked up at Bogo and smiled brightly.

"He seems nice."

Bogo didn't look at her, but the small grin plastered on his face told Judy that he felt the same.


End file.
